You made some really good points.  I would add a further distinction which may provide additional clarity - namely, the distinction between the intrinsic and extrinsic value of the Novus Ordo Mass.  The intrinsic value of any Mass - that is, the efficacious power of itself (in actu primo) is infinite - since Christ himself is the priest and victim being offered.    

The extrinsic value of the Mass, in relation to man - that is, the fruits that we derive from the Mass - is finite, and it is limited by many things.  Not just our disposition, but many other factors as well.  One thing that limits the extrinsic value of a Mass is the liturgy and the externals (the smells and bells).  The more glory the liturgy gives to God, the greater will be the extrinsic value of the Mass; the less glory it gives to God, the less extrinsic value, and hence the fewer fruits that are derived from it.  This is where the problem with the Novus Ordo comes in.

The extrinsic value of a Novus Ordo Mass is greatly diminished by the watered down liturgy, ambiguous prayers, bad translations, etc., so, it can be said to be evil (lacking in a due good) for those reasons - which relate to its extrinsic value.   But it will never be evil (lacking in a due good) intrinsically, or with respect to its intrinsic value.  

It is also clearly going too far to say no one can receives grace from a Novus Ordo.  The grace is diminished, but as long as the Mass is valid it still flow, to a greater or lesser degree, depending on how it's celebrated.  And what about those who receive communion at the Novus Ordo?   That is a separate source of grace, and there's no doubt that anyone who receives communion well disposed, receives grace from It.

I agree with 99% of this.

My only point of departure is that I would say the NOM is not only extrinsically evil (e.g., for the reasons you mention), but also intrinsically evil in the scholastic philosophical sense, because a rite of Mass lacking an offertory or any mention of a sacrifice is by that very fact suffering a privation of something natural to its nature.

This does not impede validity, all other things considered, but it does present a danger to the faith by omission.  

This, at least, is the traditional position of the SSPX apologists against the new Mass, and makes sense to me.

A one-legged man, or a two-legged chair, is intrinsically evil in the philosophical sense, but not in any kind of moral sense.

And I agree with you on the transmission of grace as well (and with +Lefebvre).

Like Archbishop Lefebvre (or Bishop Williamson), I would ask my antagonists, would you really tell a 90 year-old lady who lives next door to a conservative NO church, with no access to (or even awareness of) a TLM, that she must stay home?  +Lefebvre wouldn't.

But Hewko/Pfeiffer/Pax would.

To be consistent, you must maintain that he was a terrible modernist, who induced people to commit intrinsically evil acts in attending the new Mass (e.g., In the quote from his spiritual conference I provided, but also in his 1980 acknowledgement that those attending the NOM fulfill their Sunday obligation (which could not be the case if they were committing intrinsically evil moral acts).

He obviously had good intentions, or at least I presume so, in charity.  But good intentions do not always equal good theology or good decisions.  

 If the Japanese kept the faith, did they also keep the state of grace?  All Catholic theologians would consider that morally impossible without the sacraments (and any belief to the contrary is pious wishful thinking).

I don't know, I wasn't there when the Japanese were able to have mass again.  Theologians would consider it an impossibility to go without the sacraments and stay in the state of grace an impossibility ONLY when it is the decision/fault of the individual person.  We all have actual grace at our disposal every second of our life and we can avoid mortal sins against the natural law by this means.  In this particular situation, the japanese were persecuted and without the sacraments not of their own choosing but by Divine Providence, just as the early Christians were.  They didn't turn into heathens overnight; God did not abandon them.

He obviously had good intentions, or at least I presume so, in charity.  But good intentions do not always equal good theology or good decisions.  


I don't know, I wasn't there when the Japanese were able to have mass again.  Theologians would consider it an impossibility to go without the sacraments and stay in the state of grace an impossibility ONLY when it is the decision/fault of the individual person.  We all have actual grace at our disposal every second of our life and we can avoid mortal sins against the natural law by this means.  In this particular situation, the japanese were persecuted and without the sacraments not of their own choosing but by Divine Providence, just as the early Christians were.  They didn't turn into heathens overnight; God did not abandon them.

To remain consistent, you shoulf be arguing that according to Fr. Feeney, God would have sent missionaries (or angels) there to give them the sacraments.

To remain consistent, you shoulf be arguing that according to Fr. Feeney, God would have sent missionaries (or angels) there to give them the sacraments.

The Japanese had baptisms and marriage as the only sacraments, with all others very occasionally due to the persecutions, which you should not make light of, since many sacrificed their lives for Christ under harsh conditions.  

The new mass does not have to be proven as intrinsically morally evil in order to have a blanket "100% off limits" policy.

Oh yes it does, because your entire argument is that it is never permissible to attend it.

That can only be true if it is intrinsically evil in the moral sense.

In other words, not even in grave spiritual necessity can one attend it.

Lefebvre said the opposite (as Williamson after him).

2) According to this, you are compelled to embrace sedevacantism, since the Church cannot promulgate a morally evil rite (though it can promulgate an inrinsically evil one in the scholastic sense, which basically means a deficient one).  

The new mass is not obligatory on any Catholic to attend, in any way, shape or form.  It legally exists but is illegal to attend/say because it violates Quo Primum.

Also, you confuse the principles (i.e., theology) which produced this deficiency, with the rite itself.  But they are not the same thing: The principles/theology are the cause; the rite is the effect or result.

The theology AND the rite are deficient.  The rite is deficient because of the theology and also independent of it.

3) Straw man: Nobody is arguing all NOM are valid.

My point is this:  An invalid new mass is morally wrong to attend.  A doubtfully valid new mass is wrong to attend.  A 100% valid new mass is wrong to attend.  Validity doesn't matter.

4) If somehow a blindfolded person were wheeled into a valid black Mass and received communion thinking they were receiving communion at a normal Mass, they would receive grace.

You are using faulty Kantian logic:  I think, therefore I am.  ...I think it's a mass, therefore it is.  ...I think I'm receiving communion, therefore God is present.  It doesn't work that way.  
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If a blindfolded person were wheeled into a black mass, with a valid consecration (note, they'd also have to be deaf or earplugged to not know that craziness was going on), no, this person would not receive ANY grace from said ceremony.  They would only receive actual graces based on their disposition in THINKING (incorrectly) that they were at mass.  Reality does not exist in the mind.  Truth is the conformity of the mind TO reality.  God provides grace through mass/sacraments when they are valid/pleasing to Him, not when we THINK they are valid/pleasing.

5) That's all fine.  But truth takes time to sink in, and it was Fr. Pfeiffer himself who (rightly) said that such people do not sin until they understand the obligation to abstain.  How then can it be intrinsically evil in the moral sense (or is Fr. Pfeiffer advocating committing intrinsically evil moral acts?).  

Because the evilness of sin is separate from our guilt for it.  The new mass is evil.  In the craziness of our times, God will judge all hearts depending upon their openness to the truth and their understanding of its evil.  
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Intrinsically evil acts of the natural law can be known by all men, because the natural law is written on our hearts.  This is not so with matters of virtue and religion, because the supernatural law can only be known by grace.  Therefore, one can sin intrinsically in matters of religion and not know in the same way that all men know that murder is wrong.  But such sins are still highly displeasing to God, because He is offended even when a person is not guilty.  Sin exists outside of ourselves and the offense against God is independent of the intention of the person.

The new mass is not obligatory on any Catholic to attend, in any way, shape or form.  It legally exists but is illegal to attend/say because it violates Quo Primum.

The theology AND the rite are deficient.  The rite is deficient because of the theology and also independent of it.

My point is this:  An invalid new mass is morally wrong to attend.  A doubtfully valid new mass is wrong to attend.  A 100% valid new mass is wrong to attend.  Validity doesn't matter.


You are using faulty Kantian logic:  I think, therefore I am.  ...I think it's a mass, therefore it is.  ...I think I'm receiving communion, therefore God is present.  It doesn't work that way.  
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If a blindfolded person were wheeled into a black mass, with a valid consecration (note, they'd also have to be deaf or earplugged to not know that craziness was going on), no, this person would not receive ANY grace from said ceremony.  They would only receive actual graces based on their disposition in THINKING (incorrectly) that they were at mass.  Reality does not exist in the mind.  Truth is the conformity of the mind TO reality.  God provides grace through mass/sacraments when they are valid/pleasing to Him, not when we THINK they are valid/pleasing.

Because the evilness of sin is separate from our guilt for it.  The new mass is evil.  In the craziness of our times, God will judge all hearts depending upon their openness to the truth and their understanding of its evil.  
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Intrinsically evil acts of the natural law can be known by all men, because the natural law is written on our hearts.  This is not so with matters of virtue and religion, because the supernatural law can only be known by grace.  Therefore, one can sin intrinsically in matters of religion and not know in the same way that all men know that murder is wrong.  But such sins are still highly displeasing to God, because He is offended even when a person is not guilty.  Sin exists outside of ourselves and the offense against God is independent of the intention of the person.

By paragraph:

1) You believe the NOM is intrinsically evil in the moral sense.  But the Church cannot promulgate rites which are intrinsically evil in the moral sense.  Therefore the Church did not promugate the NOM.  You are thereforee compelled to embrace sedevacantism if you wish to maintain your opinion.

2) I notice you are now using the term "deficient."  This is good, as it is synonomous with "evil" in the scholastic sense.  This will put you on the right path (although it contradicts what you said just above).

3) Who is talking about validity?  You are objecting to the idea that it is ever morally permissible to attend a NOM (e.g., even in necessity).  You are doing this because you mistakenly believe the NOM is intrinsically evil in the moral sense, rather than in the scholastic/philosophic sense.  

4) On the contrary: You had stipulated that the black Mass would be valid.  Therefore, a well-disposed communicant would receive the transmission of sanctifying grace.  

6) You are confusing yourself, saying firstly that the consecration is valid, but later in the same paragraph that there is no Mass.  Which is it?  In any case, all that matters is that the consecration be valid, and the communicant well-disposed.  If those two conditions are present, sanctifying grace is transmitted.

7) Yes.

8: "Intrinsically evil acts of the natural law??"  Aside from being off point, this implies nobody has been deceived about the evil of the NOM, which is obviously not the case.  In fact, the majority of people fall into the opposite category (i.e., they have been deceived into believing it is good).

It's a good thing the original, pioneer trads did not think like Sean. If they did, then there would be no TLM today. They are the ones who saw the NOM for what it is and did not participate in it for any reason. Lucky thing too because otherwise, they would not have preserved it for you to boast your "take it or leave it" thinking. And you went to St. Thomas Aquinas Seminary?  

As for +ABL and other trad priests and bishops who would probably die rather than be caught saying the new "mass" for any reason, yet condone the attendance of it by others rather than wholly and vehemently condemning it for what it is, what do you call them? Consistent? Simpleminded?  Newbies, or just not well-read?

Coming from an ex trad seminarian, your defense of the New "mass" dishonors STAS - or is that what they teach there? It also dishonors the trials and efforts of all those courageous pioneer trads who wholly condemned the NOM for what it is, and handed down and preserved the True Mass - just so you could boast that there is some type of justification in compromising. +ABL called that Liberal Thinking.  

So sorry to burst your bubble, but my position is the position is the position of Archbishop Lefebvre (a pioneer trad).

And who is talking about any trad clergy saying the new Mass besides you?

You are obviously delusional about what the position of what the position of Lefebvre, SSPX, and pioneer trad priests really was (who never did or could preclude NOM attendance in subjective/individual cases of necessity, despite the general/objective policy of avoiding it.....as the quote from Lefebvre ‘s spiritual conference above makes clear).

You don’t know your history.